


your visions made of flesh and light

by intimatopia



Category: Persona 5
Genre: Akira Kurusu's Hand Kink, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gloves, Happy Ending, Insecurity, Intimacy, Kissing, Light Angst, M/M, Party, Past Child Abuse, Pining, Touch-Starved
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-29
Updated: 2020-09-29
Packaged: 2021-03-07 17:01:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,014
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26711113
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/intimatopia/pseuds/intimatopia
Summary: When Akechi looked up, Akira’s cheeks were pink. “Hey, Yusuke,” he said out loud, not taking his eyes away from Akechi just yet. “If you need a new model, how about Akechi?”
Relationships: Akechi Goro/Kurusu Akira
Comments: 34
Kudos: 272





	your visions made of flesh and light

**Author's Note:**

> i wrote this entire fic in 5 days don't look @ me. set in some vague point in canon (i didn't think about it too hard and neither should you). based on that [anthology chapter](https://m.imgur.com/a/iGYT5) where yusuke draws akechi. i wanted to write my own spin on it, but it spun...out of control....hahahahaaaa
> 
> thanks to mac for the beta and vic for reading this as i wrote it and cheering me on!

Akechi didn’t quite know when dropping by Leblanc had become a part of his weekly routine, but he found himself looking forward to it. More pleasant than most of his scheduled appointments, anyway, and it was nice to not feel so staged for a while. The thin crowd and the proprietor’s general contempt towards Akechi’s achievements were simply bonuses. He was going home from work a little early today, carrying a stack of cardboard boxes containing files he’d rather peruse in his apartment at his own leisure.

The real reason he came by was working the bar when Akechi walked in. Yusuke Kitagawa—the artist, Akira’s friend—was occupying one of the stools at the bar.

“Ann is no longer my model,” Yusuke said gloomily. Akira caught his eye over Yusuke’s head (bowed over a plate of curry) and smiled, warm as ever, and just as ever something hot and painful sang in Akechi’s stomach.

Akechi put the cardboard boxes (files from work, and also math worksheets) he was carrying down in a corner, dusted lint off the cuff of his jacket, and sat down at the bar, two seats between him and Yusuke (as far away as he could get). He had no interest in being pulled into Yusuke’s circle of melodrama. “The usual, please,” he said to Akira.

Akira nodded at him, clearly distracted. Akechi adjusted to it without thought, following Akira’s concentration towards Yusuke despite his own reluctance to be a part of Yusuke’s audience.

“Why’s that?” he asked Yusuke. “Did you ask her to model nude again?”

 _Again?_ Akechi thought. _How many times has he—?_

“I did not!” Yusuke said indignantly. “She said she doesn’t have time anymore. And that she needs time to think about some things.” He seemed utterly lost as he conveyed this. “What do you think she means by that?”

“Well,” Akira said patiently. “Probably that she needs time to think about some things. You guys went out together once or twice, didn’t you?”

Yusuke looked confused. “But that was just because I needed help with my art, and she was kind enough to come along and provide inspiration.”

“Sounds like a date to me,” Akechi cut in cheerfully, and against his better sense.

Akira nodded enthusiastically. “Definitely a date.”

“Why didn’t she _say_ so?” Yusuke asked despairingly. “I would’ve offered to pay.” He paused, and Akechi watched with bemused fascination as his face rose again. “She’d probably have turned me down. I heard her tell Makoto-san that modern girls don’t let boys pay for their food.”

“I don’t think she meant it like that,” Akira tried delicately.

Yusuke ignored this. “I don’t want to go back to sketching strangers,” he said. “It’s artistically unfulfilling. They’re never in my sight long enough for me to capture the essence of their heart.”

 _Essence of their heart,_ Akechi thought. _How is this guy real?_

“Here you go,” Akira said suddenly, putting a mug of coffee down in front of Akechi. He didn’t seem to know what to say in rejoinder to Yusuke’s statement, which was good because Akechi could hardly figure out an appropriate response himself in time. “I didn’t expect you today,” Akira told him. “I thought you had work.”

“I finished up early,” Akechi said, shrugging. “It’s quite stressful at the department now, so close to holidays, so I’m working from home for the rest of today and tomorrow.”

“Do you get any time off at all?” Akira asked gently.

“A good detective never rests,” Akechi replied at once. A scripted answer even to his own ears. Judging by the way Akira rolled his eyes, he knew it too, and it was only years of self control that prevented Akechi from blushing. Instead he buried his head in the mug of coffee, which was hot and smelled sharp and rich at once. “Perfectly sweet. Always amazing, Akira.”

When he looked up, Akira’s cheeks were pink. “Hey, Yusuke,” he said out loud, not taking his eyes away from Akechi just yet. “If you need a new model, how about Akechi?”

Akechi started, glaring at Akira. “That’s a terrible idea,” he said stiffly. The words _essence of their heart_ floated through his head. “I hardly have the time to devote myself to sitting for Yusuke-san, and—”

“It would be an interesting challenge,” Yusuke said, as though Akechi hadn’t spoken. Akechi sputtered to a halt, and sipped at his coffee to cover up his shame.

“Why don’t you give it a try?” Akira sounded perfectly innocent, a trick he deployed best when he was anything _but_ innocent. Akechi glared at him again, and he winked. “It doesn’t have to be a full painting. Perhaps simply a sketch.”

“Sketches can be extraordinarily discerning,” Yusuke said primly. “There’s nothing simple about a sketch by a skilled artist. Though I am hardly there yet, myself.”

“Careful,” Akechi murmured, too softly for anyone but Akira to hear him. “You almost sound modest.”

Akira snorted. “How about it?”

Akechi drained half his mug of coffee in the next sip, preparing for his exit.

“I don’t think I could, unfortunately,” Yusuke continued. “I don’t…” he looked at Akechi suddenly, really _looked_ at him, like he was seeing things Akechi never wanted anyone to know about. “There’s something about you,” he announced. “I can’t put my finger on it. But I don’t think I could draw you, no.”

Akechi blinked. He felt hot and cold and shriveled-up inside. “That’s that, then,” he agreed, and drained the rest of his coffee. “Thank you, Akira—have a nice day.” He nodded to Yusuke on his way to the corner, picking up his boxes and heading out.

~

Yusuke couldn’t stop thinking about it.

He’d meant what he’d said. He always meant what he said, and he didn’t understand why other people said things they didn’t mean. Yusuke couldn’t always tell when people were saying things they didn’t mean—but everything Akechi Goro said seemed laced with a falsehood no one could quite catch.

Or maybe they saw through it and _Yusuke_ was the fool here—as he was accustomed to being, the one person not in on the joke.

It wasn’t so bad with his new friends. Makoto always explained the joke, even though Ryuji complained that that ruined it. Akira didn’t seem to mind his ramblings. Ann had agreed to model for him before he’d ruined it somehow.

Still, he had faith in himself. That was necessary for an artist—one couldn’t continue through the deluge of disbelief in one’s vision without a sense of inner confidence. He’d win Ann over again eventually. He just had to formulate a plan of action, like the ones they made for their work as the Phantom Thieves.

In the meantime his art had stagnated. 

He was used to drawing on his memories of Ann to draw when he didn’t have her right in front of him, but memories of that disastrous last conversation where she’d told him she no longer wanted to model always intruded when he attempted to paint her.

So he thought about Akechi to distract himself. It wasn’t a very pleasant distraction, but it hurt less than thinking about Ann, because Akechi at least was wholly removed from Yusuke’s work.

The annoying thing about Akechi wasn’t his mask—they wore masks in their work as the Phantom Thieves, and he’d spent enough time observing Akira to know that he behaved differently with different people.

Underneath the various aspects people like Akira adopted, there was an untapped well of genuineness. Yusuke found it fascinating; all his new friends were deep and real, even when they seemed like anything but. Even Ryuji.

But _not_ Akechi.

His artifice was brittle, reflective. It repelled attempts to discover what lay beneath the surface.

Yusuke kept trying to write Akechi off as vapid, depthless as most people seemed depthless to him. Except he couldn’t seem to do that either.

He reached for his sketchbook, closing his eyes and letting the pencil hover a bare centimeter above the page. Recalled the instances when he’d encountered Akechi; when he’d come to the gallery to see Yusuke’s paintings, and been appreciative in all the right places. He’d even noted Yusuke’s artistic references to _Sayuri_ and Degas. That time he’d cornered them at the station (how odd to think of one person in front of five as _cornering,_ but Yusuke couldn’t shake off the impression). Last week at the coffee shop, when he’d run out immediately after their conversation.

There wasn’t any connection between those three people except the superficial. Yusuke was used to looking past the superficial. There had to be something there that went deeper.

 **To: Akira** — 5:32PM  
_Do you really think it’s a good idea for me to draw Akechi?_

The reply came back seconds later.

 **From: Akira** — 5:32PM  
_yes_ _  
__you said it would be a nice challenge, right?_

Yusuke huffed. Akira saw more than most, but he was still blind to the real ways of art. But there was no point explaining all that. 

**To: Akira** — 5:34PM  
_He seemed resistant to the idea._ _  
__One has to wonder if he’s hiding something._

 **From: Akira** — 5:38PM  
_you won’t get a better chance to find out._

That, at least, was undeniably true.

Akira sent him Akechi’s number a few minutes later, and Yusuke bit the back of his pencil before hastily putting it down and entering the number into his phone.

Madarame had broken him out of the habit of chewing on his art supplies, even though it helped Yusuke think. He put the pencil back in his mouth a few minutes later, chewing determinedly as he typed his message to Akechi.

 **To: Akechi** — 5:50PM  
_I would like to attempt sketching you. Are you free this week?_

 **From: Akechi** — 5:55PM  
_Did you change your mind, then?_ _  
__About sketching me._

 **To: Akechi** — 5:56PM  
_Yes. Akira thinks it would be a good idea, and his intuition on artistic matters is often right. Are you free this week?_

 **From: Akechi** — 5:59PM  
_Not this week, sorry. How about Sunday (the 17th)?_

Yusuke chewed on his pencil harder. That was later than he’d prefer, but he was determined to be grateful for a chance at all.

 **To: Akechi** — 6:01PM  
_Sunday is okay. Thank you._

 **From: Akechi** — 6:02PM  
_You’re welcome._

~

Akira wasn’t home when Yusuke let himself in, which was to be expected. Akechi _was_ , though, sitting at the bar and chatting with the Boss. It appeared to be a conversation about coffee, which was a deplorable subject at the best of times.

“You too?” Boss said, when he saw Yusuke. 

“I apologize if we’re inconveniencing you,” Yusuke said at once. He wanted to be on Sojiro’s good side (if he had one). He could make Akira’s life difficult. Yusuke did not want to contribute any more hardships to his friend than had already been served. “I asked Akira if we could use his room while he was out, and he said it was fine.”

Then he wondered if he shouldn’t have said that. 

“He let me know,” Boss sighed. “I was just kidding, but you don’t seem to grasp sarcasm too well. That’s on me. I’ll leave you boys to it. Don’t do anything stupid.”

“Thank you,” Yusuke nodded. Then he turned to Akechi. “Were you waiting long?”

“Only a few minutes,” Akechi smiled. He was wearing a patterned sweater vest over a shirt today. Yusuke didn’t like noticing people’s clothes, but he had nothing else to notice. “Can I finish my coffee?”

Yusuke nodded. Noted details in his head—details were vital, but secondary to the essence of a person—the texture of Akechi’s soft leather gloves, the fall of his hair.

Ann’s hair had so much more character. Everything about Ann had more character, from the way she dressed to the way she held herself. Akechi was remarkable in that he was wholly unremarkable.

And yet, he was famous on both social media and TV. Yusuke couldn’t fathom why. A good artist never discounted the opinion of the public, however uncultured it was. The judgement of the crowd was the harshest, but in some cases the most discerning. It could also be wholly misguided (there was _no_ soul to Kinkade’s paintings), and Yusuke was of the firm opinion that the public was wrong about Akechi.

“I’m done,” Akechi said, standing up. “Shall we?”

Akira’s loft was surprisingly conducive to art. Something about the way Akira’s presence permeated it, a constant reminder of his faith in Yusuke. The light was bad, but the desk lamp sufficed for a sketch.

“You can sit on the bed,” Yusuke told Akechi, who complied with a pleasant and irritatingly empty expression.

Yusuke clicked his tongue and turned away to pull a chair over. “Do you want a specific pose or expression?” Akechi questioned from behind him.

“No, just sit as it feels natural to you.” 

When Yusuke turned around, he discovered that Akechi’s _natural_ was not far off from Makoto’s, bolt-upright and facing forward. But where Makoto was ever-fidgeting, fussing with her skirt or her hair as she fretted over her topic of the hour, Akechi was doing his best impression of the marble busts Yusuke had been drawing since he was in diapers.

At least those were imitations of great figures, tragic heros and the like. Akechi’s smile was mostly reminiscent of the T.V. hosts he nattered on with all the time.

Yusuke vaguely considered drawing a T.V. where Akechi’s head should be. But that was overdone, and also the coward’s way out. So instead he shifted his focus as he’d been taught, trying to see less of Akechi-the-corporeal-shape and more of Akechi-the-person.

It was _no good._ Akechi remained frustratingly solid and opaque in front of him, and Yusuke bit the back of his pencil and began sketching anyway, drawing lines and hating every one of them.

The end result was a perfectly serviceable sketch. Yusuke would have been proud of it.

In _third grade._

“Are you alright?” Akechi asked, startling Yusuke out of his angry contemplation.

“Yes,” Yusuke bit out. “No. I can’t draw you.”

Akechi abandoned his pose and came over to the desk, looking at the sketchbook over Yusuke’s shoulder. “That looks like me, I think,” he said.

“It _looks_ like you,” Yusuke snapped. “But it _reveals_ nothing about you. Good art is transcendental. It achieves more than the sum of its parts. This might be achieving _less,_ though I hardly thought that likely.” He finished off with a glare at Akechi, because this was his fault. He never had this problem with Ann.

Well, not in the same way. Ann was so much _more_ than he could pin down. 

“I see,” Akechi said, a few seconds later. “Have you ever read Hegel, Kitagawa-kun?”

Yusuke stared at Akechi. Akechi looked perfectly innocent and perfectly serious. On anyone else, Yusuke would have believed that look. He didn’t generally distrust people.

He did not trust Akechi at all, though, so he cautiously said, “No.”

Akechi nodded. “Hegel talked about appearance a lot, contrasting it with the essence of a subject.” He paused for a second, and then went on. “ _Schein_ and _Erscheinung_. _Schein_ is the shining forth of an essence, whereas _Erscheinung_ is its full disclosure.”

“Er shining would be nice,” Yusuke said. “But I’ll settle for shine.”

“ _Erscheinung_ and _Schein_ ,” Akechi corrected. 

Yusuke took a closer look at him. Though his expression hadn’t changed, it seemed a touch more genuine now. Yusuke had the vivid feeling that Akechi would not have been out of place at an art school. Perhaps as some kind of musician. It would fit with what Yusuke recalled of the shape of Akechi’s hands, the precise way he used them.

“Take off your gloves,” Yusuke commanded abruptly.

Akechi took a step back. “I can’t do that,” he said, like it wasn’t his decision to make.

Yusuke wasn’t having it. “You can,” he insisted. “I want to draw them.”

“What, my _hands_?”

“They reveal a lot about a person,” Yusuke said. He didn’t understand Akechi’s resistance to the idea, which was so simple it should have struck Yusuke weeks ago. “And I think it would be an interesting exercise, to draw you with your gloves off.” Akechi muttered something too low and fast for Yusuke to catch, though he spotted the words _Ann_ and _nudes._ He ignored it. “I feel like this is the answer. Will you indulge me?”

“Since you ask so _nicely_ ,” Akechi snapped, and tugged his gloves off.

For a moment Yusuke couldn’t find the words. Then he abandoned the attempt and reached for his sketchbook, chest tight with that feeling—grief, perhaps, or anger.

He risked a glance at Akechi’s face. He looked as cold and distant as ever, but that plasticky little smile was gone, and without it he looked even more like a marble bust. But he didn’t _feel_ like a marble bust anymore.

Marble didn’t bleed the way Yusuke was sure Akechi’s hands had. He didn’t know what could cause scars like that, but images flew through his head as he sketched. What kind of accident could make something like that? The thought that it was deliberate—that someone had purposefully wrapped glass wire tight around Akechi’s hands, for so long and so hard the marks were still visible—was even worse.

It was no longer a wonder that Akechi wore gloves.

In the end, Yusuke ended up with just the one sketch of Akechi’s hands, drawn clenched in his lap with the glove held in his palm. The remainder were of Akechi’s profile, less human than angelic, made lonely by its glow.

He’d convert it to a painting later. For now, his pencil flew across the page with an ease it hadn’t had in a long time. Not since his best days with Ann—perhaps better, because here he didn’t doubt his ability to capture the essence shining forth. 

“Thank you,” Yusuke said, some amount of time later. His throat was dry.

Akechi didn’t reply. His shoulders slumped slightly when Yusuke put the sketchbook on the desk, though, exhausted in a way which made Yusuke want to draw again even though his fingers were cramping.

He straightened up again before Yusuke could make a proper decision, putting his gloves back on. “Did you get what you wanted?” he asked, shallow pleasantness back in full force.

It was easier to discount it now, though. “Thank you,” Yusuke repeated. “I did.”

“Good to hear,” Akechi said cheerfully, standing up. “I’ll be on my way, then.” It was kind of dizzying, how perfectly and seamlessly the mask was back in place. 

But was it? Yusuke could spot cracks in it if he looked carefully, now; the strain around Akechi’s eyes, the edge of hysteria to his voice, the jerkiness of his movements. 

Yusuke made a decision, hoped he wouldn’t regret this later. He flipped through his sketchbook until he found the right page and ripped it out, and ripped out another page from the back to prevent the pencil from smudging. “Here,” he said stiffly, holding it out to Akechi. Though an apology might have been in order, Yusuke never apologized for art. But there were some violations Yusuke couldn’t stomach being party to. 

Akechi’s expression slipped when he saw the drawing, more vulnerable than Yusuke could have imagined him looking. “Is this the onl—”

“Yes,” Yusuke bit out. “It is.” He hesitated. “Other people—see my sketchbook.”

“Thank you,” Akechi murmured. He seemed shaken. “I’ll be on my way now.”

~

That damned piece of paper felt like it was burning a hole through Akechi’s bag the entire train ride home; he couldn’t shake off the feeling that people would know it was there, and ask to see it, and then have opinions about it.

Everyone had opinions about Akechi. He’d made sure of it. But there was a part of him that was always too young to understand why he was being hurt, and for its sake and for his own, Akechi never took his gloves off where people could see (he hardly took them off where he himself could see; he hated his hands), but then he’d gone and ruined all of that for—

For _what_?

For a sketch of his hands that had nearly made Akechi scream when he first saw it?

He didn’t even know where he was going to keep it. He kept little of actual importance at his apartment, because he didn’t trust the cook or the cleaning staff. He kept nothing important on his laptop or phone, because both had been hacked before.

Through that lens, trusting his gloves to hide his secrets was hardly wise. But the only thing better would be to cut his hands off entirely, and Akechi hadn’t fallen off that edge quite yet.

He stared at his hands in the midst of a crowded train compartment and superimposed the sketch on top of them. There was no denying that Yusuke Kitagawa had accurately captured how he held things.

In the end, though, Akechi had no one but himself to blame. He’d agreed to model for Yusuke. 

He’d agreed to take his gloves off, though he could have simply left.

These were exactly the kinds of mistakes Akechi couldn’t afford to be making. He was still berating himself as he keyed in the combination for his flat, still thinking about the sketch as he went through the motions of heating dinner in the microwave and eating it.

He hardly tasted it, though, and reached for his phone the second it lit up with a message. 

**From: Akira** — 9:16PM  
_how did it go? yusukes not telling me 4 some reason_ _  
__you dont have to either if you dont wanna_

Akechi dithered over his reply, torn between telling Akira to fuck off and being touched that he’d reached out at all. Not that he’d ever tell Akira to fuck off, anyway.

 **To: Akira** — 9:20PM  
_He seemed pleased with the results._

 **From: Akira** — 9:21PM  
_and are you?_

Damn Akira for being so astute. Damn him for— _everything_ he was, the only person Akechi wanted to be seen by and the only person he couldn’t have like that.

 **To: Akira** — 9:23PM  
_Perfectly adequate._

He ignored the messages after that, and did not finish dinner. He still had case files to look through.

~

 **From: Akira** — 4:11PM  
_pleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeaaaaaaase_

 **To: Akira** — 4:16PM  
_Fine, but you owe me._

 **From: Akira** — 4:17PM  
_anything you want <3_ _  
__ill see you there @ 7_

~

Makoto was already chainsmoking by the time Akechi walked in (at five minutes past seven, because he’d stopped to give directions to someone), and that wasn’t even the only illegal substance being consumed in Akira’s room.

Ryuji had found alcohol.

“You are all _teenagers,_ ” Akechi said severely.

“What are you, a cop?” Ryuji yelled cheerfully, and handed him a glass of beer. 

Akechi winced. “Close enough to one that I shouldn’t be here—” he started, but then Akira crashed into him.

“You came!” he sang out.

“Have you been drinking?” Akechi asked suspiciously.

“No,” Akira said, and took the glass of beer from Akechi. He drank the whole thing down in three gulps, briefly mesmerizing Akechi with the way his throat moved. “Yes.”

He got a pat on the cheek before Akira was distracted again by Ann yelling something from the other end of the room. The warmth of Akira’s hand haunted him as he made his way to where Makoto was sitting on a box. 

She offered him a cigarette.

“Thank you,” Akechi declined. “I wouldn’t have taken you for the kind, but I guess it isn’t surprising with the company—”

“Sae taught me,” Makoto said.

Akechi mentally revised his opinion of Sae. “I meant only that wrangling this lot would be enough to break the strongest will.”

“She didn’t _mean_ to teach me.”

Akechi held his palm out for a cigarette. Makoto handed it to him lit.

Despite the loud music that started a few minutes later and Ann’s increasing inebriation, it was a pleasant way to pass the evening. Ryuji was arguing the merits of American football at a thoroughly bemused and entirely sober Yusuke (he’d caught Akechi’s eye for half a second before turning away), and Ann was trying without much success to braid Akira’s hair (he kept trying to snuggle her shoulder). Makoto kept up a steady stream of snarky comments next to him, and took it with grace when he cut her off two cigarettes later.

She left soon after, patting him on the shoulder.

Strange, even now, that they knew what he intended for them and still touched him. In the haze of smoke and sound, the brush of her fingers against him rang bright and clear. Akechi was marked and haunted, and craved it too much to mind.

Ryuji was the last to clear out.

Akira drifted around, mostly sober now but still so flushed and happy it hurt to look at him. He was picking up cans and wrappers, and Akechi moved to help him without a word.

“You’re still here,” Akira said to him, like he hadn’t noticed.

Akechi never knew what to say to Akira. He never knew the right combination of words that would make Akira look at him like—like he was new and lovely and priceless. And he was spoiled, because Akira looked at him like that no matter what he said.

They were only cleaning up, but it felt like a dance whose steps they’d traced a thousand times over, music still echoing through the smell of nicotine. Akechi felt drunk without having consumed a drop of alcohol, intoxicated by the wonder of not being lonely for once.

“I am,” Akechi acknowledged at last.

Akira pushed him onto the bed. “Good,” he said quietly, as Akechi tried to remember how to breathe. “Did you have fun?”

 _How do you do it?_ Akechi thought. Akira was standing so close Akechi could feel the heat of his body, but no matter where he stood Akechi remained utterly defenseless against him. He towered over Akechi, now, and Akechi couldn’t remember if this was something he minded. Akira made him irrational and stupid and needy and still Akechi liked himself more when he was with Akira.

It was nothing like the last time he’d sat on Akira’s bed, with his gloves off and Yusuke at the desk. Akechi’s heart had been beating itself to pieces the entire time, nerves screaming at him to cut his losses and run even as the inertia of terror froze him in place.

“Watching you make a fool of yourself is always my idea of fun,” he said out loud, but he was breathless and there was no bite to the words.

Akira knew it—he _grinned,_ sharp and charming, climbing into Akechi’s lap and pushing him roughly back against the wall. He was solid, not heavy but unmistakable. “Careful, there,” he purred, like it wasn’t _his_ fault. “You don’t want to get caught _looking_ at me, do you?”

Akechi felt that like a knife to his stomach, a phantom pain like being disarmed, just as frightening. “I’m _not_ —” he tried in vain.

He got no further before Akira was pressing their lips together.

Whatever Akechi had imagined kissing Akira to be like—and he _had_ , though he tucked those fantasies in alongside the memories too sweet for him to touch—it was nothing like the reality. Akira’s mouth tasted like beer and chips and his lips were _soft_ , so soft Akechi almost didn’t know what to do with them.

Akira had clearly kissed people before; he didn’t seem to hesitate before deepening the kiss, even as Akechi felt terribly fragile and unused to any part of this, senses overtaken by the sight and smell and _sound_ of Akira and how unbelievably good it was to be held, caged in by Akira’s weight and touched everywhere Akechi had never imagined someone, much less Akira, touching him.

Like the back of his neck, where Akira had cupped his palm to guide Akechi’s head, or his side just under his ribs where a knife would be fatal and Akira’s other hand was even more so. 

Like Akira’s mouth against the underside of his jaw, nipping teasingly. Akechi moaned, low and awful, and Akira bit harder.

“I thought about doing this to you so many times,” Akira confessed, laying his head against Akechi’s chest, over the treacherous rabbit-fast beat of his heart, frightened and delighted by the knowledge that Akira had thought about this when Akechi hadn’t had the courage. “Every time I’ve seen you for _weeks._ ”

“Careful,” Akechi said hysterically. He was trying to reorganize what he knew about Akira with _this_ in mind, but his intellect was on vacation and the only thing on duty was Akechi’s ravenous desire for more kissing. “You don’t _want_ to get caught looking at me, do you?”

“I _do_ , though,” Akira murmured, dark and fierce. Akechi’s heart was beating so fast it hurt. “I do.”

Akechi felt a distant curl of shame at how _unashamed_ Akira was about this—but he also couldn’t yank Akira up for another kiss fast enough, clumsy and rushed. 

He felt lit up on the inside with Akira’s warmth. He thought he said _please,_ and then he said it again and again until Akira shushed him with a soft laugh, as though Akechi’s desperation was more charming than embarrassing. As though he didn’t mind how badly Akechi seemed to need him, indulging it until Akechi was spoiled to death.

But Akira was tired, and even his energy had a limit. Akechi pushed him away when he yawned, but Akira only rearranged them so they were bracketing each other on a bed hardly wide enough for one, knees knocking together and Akira’s ankles draped over Akechi’s.

In the dim light it was easier to look directly at Akira without fear; he was smiling slightly, and his hair was a mess. He reached between them for Akechi’s hand, lacing their fingers together. Akechi wished he wasn’t wearing gloves, so he could feel Akira’s hand against his. It would be, he imagined, warm, rough with all the work he did and all the lives he held.

But Akira seemed content to just lie like that, while Akechi felt too keyed up for silence.

“Did you know people glow?” he asked, unable to help himself. “A thousand times too dim for us to see. But we give off our own light, like anglerfish, or that glowing moss.”

“I’m not surprised you know that,” Akira mumbled. “You like knowing things.”

Akechi felt punctured by the unvarnished truth of it, said in Akira’s deep sleep-rough voice. He deflated slightly, wondering whether an apology was in order.

“Don’t be like that,” Akira admonished, like he could hear Akechi’s thoughts. “I like it.”

“When I’m a know-it-all,” Akechi said skeptically.

Akira squeezed his hand. “No.” He was quiet for a long time, like he was looking for the words. Akechi searched for them in Akira’s face. “You like knowing things. You like sharing them with other people. It’s nice. I like it when you tell me stuff.”

“I see,” Akechi said, helplessly charmed. “How eloquently put.”

“Go to sleep, asshole,” Akira said, entirely without heat, and Akechi closed his eyes still smiling.

~

When Akechi had been younger—before his ambitions had gotten him anywhere, and before he figured out how to make people look at him—he’d gotten used to being overlooked. Being overlooked was supposed to be nicer than being bullied, was how the adults put it, and privately Akechi couldn’t decide whether or not he agreed.

On one hand, at least he wasn’t being punched around anymore. On the other, people had to _look_ at him to punch him. They had to _touch_ him to punch him.

A teacher had patted his shoulder awkwardly when he got an A on a geography test, and Akechi had thought about it for a week. Maybe longer. People didn’t touch him, and Akechi remembered it when they did.

So it was terrifying when he found himself forgetting the details of how Akira had kissed him that night. Whether he’d put his hand on Akechi’s stomach before sliding it to his ribs, whether he’d kissed Akechi’s ears after ruining his mouth. It blurred together, golden-red and so impossibly sweet Akechi’s heart spun madly when he thought about it. Even Akira’s voice was hard to recollect, more random phrases than the entire conversations Akechi was used to recalling perfectly.

He pressed the tips of his gloved fingers to his mouth the next day, Akira’s last good morning kiss still lingering on his tongue like melting sugar, and felt half-pleased and half-ashamed.

His desire was ruining things. He’d never felt more whole in his life.

He wanted to call Akira up and beg him for more kisses. It was embarrassing and rather heady, to be brought so low by want for something he never thought he’d have.

The crushing immediacy of it faded, though, as Akechi returned to his everyday life. School and work and TV appearances, and then homework, and then prep for next week’s TV appearance, and imagined conversations where people asked him why he looked so pleased with himself now and he said, _I’ve been kissing someone lately and he’s wonderful._

Foolish to even think about saying that. For one, his father might kill Akechi. Worse, he might kill Akira (before Akechi had a chance to). Secondly, there was no way he could admit to kissing a boy on TV, much less liking it.

Thirdly, though it was wonderful to think of flaunting the fact that someone _wanted_ to kiss him, there was no guarantee Akira ever wanted to do it again.

And lastly: Akechi liked having secrets. He liked having secrets _with_ Akira.

Though there was a solid chance all the Phantom Thieves knew by now that Akira had kissed Akechi, and probably also that Akechi had _begged_ for it. That he’d made a terrible fool of himself. They’d probably laughed at him about it.

That was no better than he deserved, Akechi determined grimly, and resolved not to see them again. Akira kept texting him, questions about whether he’d heard of a certain singer (Akechi had), whether he was free that week (he wasn’t), and whether Akechi wanted to go out for drinks sometime, Akira knew this nice place (for heaven’s sake, they were _both_ underage). It took all of Akechi’s self-control not to cave.

 **From: Akira** — 3:12AM  
_it doesnt have to be alcoholic :(_ _  
__boba tea is a drink_ _  
__I know youre awake_ _  
_ — 3:20AM _  
__do you hate me so much now?_

 **To: Akira** — 3:27AM  
_It’s not about hate._ _  
__Well, it is, but I don’t hate you._ _  
__You should be asleep._

It hurt. There was no denying how much it hurt, how desolate Akechi felt in the days after that last conversation. 

He spent all his time after that worrying about Akira, wondering if he was alright. Whether he was sleeping enough and being mean enough to all the people out to use him. Not that Akira really _needed_ Akechi to think of him like that. Hollowly, he realized Akira didn’t really need Akechi at all, while Akechi felt like something had been pried out of him with a knife, and the wound left to bleed. There was no way to cauterize it, either.

But there was no wound; it was all in his head. He walked with his back straight, and shook everyone’s hand, and thought about saying _good art is more than the sum of its parts_ every time his smile stretched wider, convincing the world he was shallow enough for them to see themselves in and hollow enough that in the end he didn’t even matter all that much.

He didn’t matter, and what happened to him and what he wanted to happen to him didn’t matter either. There was only the way he clutched himself at night to say otherwise.

 **From: Yusuke Kitagawa** — 11:07AM  
_I need to ask you something. When are you free?_

Someone, Akechi considered, really needed to beat social mores into Kitagawa’s head. The only reason Akechi didn’t want to shrivel up and die of anxiety at the sight of those words was that he was convinced Yusuke was too interpersonally incompetent to constitute a real threat.

But he was well aware that he was just as interpersonally inept, substituting references to philosophers his peers had never heard of in lieu of actual connection, and as such had no stones to throw that wouldn’t hit his own glass walls first.

 **To: Yusuke Kitagawa** — 11:08AM  
_I might be able to spare about an hour between four and five today, depending on where you want to meet._

 **From: Yusuke Kitagawa** — 11:10AM  
_I live in a dormitory at Kosei. But it’s not quiet enough to talk._

What an utterly useless fellow, Akechi thought, insincerely and spitefully. He was trying not to think about having to sit still for Yusuke’s coldly discerning gaze. He was largely failing.

 **To: Yusuke Kitagawa** — 11:11AM  
_There’s a park near where I live. I’ll text you the address. Is that alright?_

 **From: Yusuke Kitagawa** — 11:15AM  
_Yes._

Akechi’s mind being as terribly overactive as it was, he spent most of the intervening time wondering what Yusuke wanted to talk about. Was it some kind of ambush? Who would Akechi have brought to an ambush of that kind? Akira, for sure, and probably Makoto. Some part of Akechi that had never learnt better was still terrified of Ryuji, but hopefully no one had picked up on that. Futaba unnerved him, but she also didn’t get out much. 

He reorganized the information he had with Akira’s strategic maneuvers in mind, carefully planning for contingencies. Set up a fake call on his phone to go off at irregular intervals so he had an excuse to get out if need be.

He was so prepared for the worst case scenario that he stopped short when the only person at the park was Yusuke. He glanced around surreptitiously, half-expecting the rest to have hidden themselves behind bushes.

But this park didn’t _have_ bushes. It was a jogger’s park, all lawns and paths at right angles.

“I hope the journey here wasn’t too long,” Akechi said gingerly to Yusuke. He was busy trying to rework his plans in his head, trying to figure out where he’d gone so wrong.

“It was quite pleasant,” Yusuke replied seriously. “I was able to observe some interesting poses on the subway.”

Akechi stared at him, unable to figure out if that was a joke.

“I would love to talk about art with you some other time,” Yusuke continued. “You have interesting ideas, quite unlike those my teachers hold. However, that’s not what I wanted to discuss today.”

Akechi felt frozen, even though Yusuke was hardly looking at him. He was recalling romance movies where the heroine’s best friend punched the hero for breaking her heart. _You’ll have to reschedule if you want to punch me, I have two TV appearances this week._ But his mouth had stopped working.

“The sketches I made that day,” Yusuke said, after a long pause.

Belatedly, Akechi realized that pause had been for _him_ to say something. _Who’s interpersonally incompetent now?_ But he took a deep breath, steeling himself. “What about them?”

“I showed them to a couple of people whose opinion I value,” Yusuke explained. “One of them is a private art collector. She wanted it for her own collection, but I thought I should ask you first.”

“Ask me first about what?” Akechi said blankly. He was stuck on _a couple of people._ Was one of them Akira? What would Akechi even _do_ if it was Akira?

“If you wanted them,” Yusuke said, impatience sharpening his voice. “Since they’re of you.”

“Are you this considerate to your other models as well?” Akechi inquired, unable to help himself. _Did you ask her to model nude again?_

“I was made aware that I should be,” Yusuke answered stiffly. “If I wanted to maintain working relationships with them.”

“Does this mean you want to sketch me again?” Akechi said, swift to the logical conclusion.

Yusuke appeared to genuinely consider this. “It was less futile than I had expected,” he said at last. “That alone is worth exploring. But I do not currently wish to, no.”

Akechi knew less and less what to do, what he wanted, whether what he said now would be an answer he was alright with tomorrow, or a month from now, or five years from now—if he was even alive five years from now.

That was the thought that made the decision, though Akechi’s unease hadn’t faded in the slightest. He didn’t want people to see him like that, but it wouldn’t matter if he wasn’t around to feel violated by their eyes. Imagined a raw, smudged sketch on some wall in a home he’d never step into, and hated it, and himself more for saying, “You may do what you please with them. It’s your work, after all.”

Yusuke nodded crisply. “That was all I wished to talk about.” He didn’t move after he said that, and Akechi waited expectantly. “Akira—”

 _Welp, here we go,_ Akechi thought hysterically. Here came the part where he’d know for sure he was _never_ seeing Akira again—

“Akira told me to tell you he misses you,” Yusuke finished, and then frowned. “Did something happen? I may not know much about people, but I was under the impression you two were getting along.”

That was entirely not what Akechi had been expecting. “I,” he began, and then found he couldn’t go on. “I didn’t…” _mean to do any of that. Oh god, I didn’t mean any of that._

_Fuck._

“Do you have the sketches with you?” The words tripped over themselves in Akechi’s haste to get them out. “Like, right now?”

“Yes,” Yusuke said, sounding lost. “Do you want to see them?”

Akechi nodded frantically, and then forced the hysteria back into his bones where it couldn’t make a fool of him. His fingers still shook as he took the sheets of paper Yusuke held out.

 _When did he have time,_ was Akechi’s first thought, and then recognition set in like the dull clang of a coffin door slamming shut. Because that was _him_ , alright. That was _all_ him. The fall of his hair, the grim set to his mouth, the loneliness Akechi had striven to erase from his body and that Yusuke had effortlessly pinned back.

And that was only the first sketch. The second one was a watercolour painting, in light blue and golden-yellow, somehow giving off the impression of terrible holiness and terrible age. 

Akechi blinked, trying to clear the image from his eyes. The third was oil pastels, though Akechi could make out the lines of pencil underneath still. Bold colours and strokes, a rage he didn’t know he still carried reflected back at him through the lens of Yusuke’s interpretation. Akechi couldn’t look at the intensity of it for too long.

“You’re an incredible artist,” Akechi said at last. He didn’t know how long he’d spent looking at the pieces. “I...would it be too much to ask you to hold onto them? Just for a little longer?”

“Of course not,” Yusuke said, surprisingly (and therefore crushingly) gentle. “I would be glad.”

“Thank you,” Akechi replied, aching with the weight of how little he deserved Yusuke’s kindness. He handed the papers back. “Thank you.”

Yusuke left at last, and Akechi tried to recollect himself.

In the end, he failed, and walked home feeling as cracked open as he had while staring at Yusuke’s art, burning inside with how awful it was to be seen and known and still pinned into a beautiful shape.

~

 **To: Akira** — 5:43PM  
_I’m so sorry._ _  
__Can we still meet?_

 **From: Akira** — 6:03PM  
_akechi_ __  
_what am i gonna do with you?_ _  
__yes. whenever youre free_

Akechi put his phone face-down on the couch, burying his face in his hands even though there was no one around to see him trembling with pain and relief.

~

LeBlanc was empty when Akechi pushed the door open. For a second Akechi was gripped with the anxious certainty that he’d come to the wrong place. But it _was_ LeBlanc, and Akechi was done with his own cowardice. He sat down at the bar on his usual seat.

Akira came out of the pantry a few minutes later. “I thought I’d hear you come in,” he said.

Akechi didn’t reply; he was too busy _looking_ at Akira, scanning his features as if he could see everything he’d missed in the past month. Akira looked as he ever did; his hair was messier than usual, and his eyes were slightly bloodshot behind the glasses like he hadn’t been sleeping too well. Akechi swallowed down the pang of guilt, though he had no way of telling whether it really was because of him.

“I wasn’t trying to be quiet,” Akechi said carefully. He’d rehearsed everything he’d say so carefully in his head, and now in front of Akira all he had was empty words and knots in his tongue.

“Natural gift for stealth,” Akira replied, because he didn’t suffer from the same affliction.

Akechi wanted to touch him so badly, like a starved fire in his body. “Do you want to go upstairs?” he asked, panicking with the way the words were too close together.

“Sure,” Akira said. “Wait there for me while I close up?” His face was blank, unreadable.

“Okay,” Akechi said meekly.

But he ended up standing just outside Akira’s door, fiddling with the tips of his glove’s fingers, and waiting for Akira’s footsteps on the bottom stair so Akechi could rush into his room and pretend he’d been there all along.

Akechi had never actually been _good_ at grand gestures, and he felt obscurely determined to kneecap this one every way he could. He wrestled the urge back and forth for so long he missed Akira’s footsteps—and he took the stairs three at a time, dratted man, and Akechi felt sure he’d known that and just forgotten because he was a terrible person in every way.

That line of thought sounded stupid even in his head. He abandoned it swiftly, strangled it to nothing, and met Akira’s eyes. “There’s a very interesting water stain on your wall,” he told Akira politely, and then attempted to shank himself mentally and invisibly.

“Show me,” Akira demanded, taking the last four steps in one stride.

Akechi pointed it out. They both contemplated it for several seconds. “Looks like a duck,” Akira said at last.

“It looks like a ship without sails to me,” Akechi said. He didn’t actually know what was coming out of his mouth, and it felt like watching a muted car crash in slow motion. “Or some kind of mongoose—”

“Is this what you came here to talk about?” Akira interrupted ruthlessly.

Akechi shut his mouth sharply. Shook his head.

Akira’s bed was unmade despite it being nearly night. Akechi forced himself not to look at it. “I,” he began. “I’m sorry I ran out on you.”

“Technically, you didn’t,” Akira said gently. “You just ghosted me. For a month. But you stayed all night.”

Akechi winced. “Don’t, don’t try to—”

“Sorry,” Akira said quickly. 

If Akechi kept thinking about this he was going to have some kind of extremely embarrassing panic attack. Hearing Akira apologize when he hadn’t done anything wrong except try to be nice to Akechi was only making it worse.

He pulled the paper out of his pocket (neatly folded in half) and held it out to Akira without trying to look at him. Felt Akira take the paper from his grip before returning his hand to his side.

God, he wanted to bite his nails. He hadn’t bitten his nails since he was _eleven._

“Is this what Yu—”

“Yeah.”

“Is it _real_?”

“Yes.”

“ _Akechi._ ” Akira sounded utterly horrified.

“Don’t, please,” Akechi snapped, wound tight and cold and harsh. “It was years ago.”

“But you still wear the gloves,” Akira noted. He’d processed his shock and moved onto kindness, and that was even worse. “Can I touch you?”

“No,” Akechi grit out. He didn’t think he deserved it, and he didn’t imagine he could bear it. His hands didn’t seem to belong to his body, and his body didn’t seem to belong to him either. No point in touch, no matter how much Akechi craved it.

“Okay,” Akira exhaled. “Will you look at me?”

Akechi wanted to say no to that too, but his resolve was already crumbling. Akira was looking right back at him, dark-warm eyes and careful expression. There was still a hint of pity in his face, or maybe Akechi was simply being uncharitable about people trying to be nice to him. He’d been known to do that, after all.

“Thank you for letting me see it,” Akira said finally, and folded the paper back into half and handed it back.

Or rather, he _tried_ to hand it back to Akechi. Akechi shook his head. “I want you to keep it.”

Now Akira looked surprised. Akechi realized that he’d been staring directly at Akira’s face for the past few seconds and deliberately ran his eyes over the room before returning them to Akira’s face. “Are you sure?” Akira asked hesitantly.

“It’s safer with you than it is with me,” Akechi said. He’d recited this part in his head for hours. It was relieving to be on known territory for once. “There’s no indication that it’s a drawing of _my_ hands—after all, I’m not the only person in the world that wears gloves—so even if someone were to find it among your things you could pass it off as something else. I couldn’t, and besides I don’t even know what to do with it. I want you to have it.”

“You’ve thought this through.” Akira took another look at the drawing. Akechi wondered what he saw in it. Whether he saw Akechi as someone pathetic and pitiable now.

“I know it may come as a surprise to you—”

Akira looked up and raised an eyebrow. Akechi shut his mouth, burning with ridiculous shame.

“I could let you run your mouth, but then we’d be here all night,” Akira said dryly.

“And then I’d run away again.” His voice came out flat, but mostly he felt terrified enough to try running away _now._

“Have a little faith in yourself,” Akira smiled.

“That’s your job,” Akechi said before he could stop himself.

Akira’s eyes were so hot it should have scorched Akechi to keep looking at them, but he was trapped. “ _My_ job now, is it,” Akira purred, and there was a second when nothing happened and Akechi didn’t know whether he should try to make a break for it—

The next second, Akira was kissing him.

It wasn’t as messy as last time, but Akechi felt so much more fragile now that it cut as deep to be touched—to be held, when Akira knew another part of what was wrong with him. Akechi wanted to think Akira could weave him back into his body, close up the cracks, and somehow the thought made him bold. He raised his hands tentatively to rest his palms against Akira’s sides, the way Akira had done to him. Akira, who was being so careful with him, Akechi thought he might have died and gone to a heaven he’d never believed was for him.

Akira placed his own hands just above the crook of Akechi’s elbow, pulling away from the kiss. It was only then that Akechi realized it must not have gone on too long.

It had felt like an age in his head.

He didn’t know what to do with himself in the aftermath, and knew even less what to do when Akira leaned against him, head on his shoulder. Akechi put his arms around Akira’s back experimentally, and was rewarded with the sweet burden of Akira’s entire weight.

“I missed you,” Akira said, voice slightly muffled. “And I was worried about you.”

 _I can take care of myself,_ Akechi thought about saying, but—he’d missed Akira too, and worried about him. There was so _much_ to worry about. Akira was reckless and far too kind and self-destructive enough to put himself within Akechi’s reach over and over again. So he said nothing, pressing his cheek harder against the soft crush of Akira’s curls, and tightened his grip on Akira.

Akira seemed content to stay like that, and despite the worry gnawing at Akechi’s stomach, he relaxed too. Enough to close his eyes, pinch the tips of his fingers.

It was unnerving to feel the air between his fingers. He balled his hand into a fist and then uncurled it, stepping away from Akira in the same movement, before he could lose his nerve and run away.

He held his palm blindly out to Akira, relief and anxiety reacting badly with each other in his stomach. Relief won out when Akira took his palm. His fingers were warm where Akechi’s own were clammy with sweat, evenly callused instead of obscenely scarred.

Akechi couldn’t stop staring at it. Sometimes he forgot these hands were his hands, because it hurt that they belonged to him. Now he tried desperately to imagine the opposite, wanting to be someone Akira was touching. Akira was gentle with it, though, and for once Akechi didn’t mind. He’d craved it too badly and for too long to complain now.

His other hand, the one clutching the glove, ached with how tight he’d fisted it trying to keep the uncovered one limp and relaxed for Akira’s perusal.

“How long did it take to heal?” Akira asked finally, pressing his thumb against the base of Akechi’s index finger. 

That wasn’t the question Akechi had expected. “Seven months,” he said unevenly. “Give or take. There was quite a lot of nerve damage, and then an infection, and then a year of physical therapy on top of that. I had to learn how to write again.” And learn how to do everything else again, too. He’d felt like such a _child_ , unable to maintain his grip on so much as a spoon.

He was almost perfectly ambidextrous now, and had switched his dominant hand just to prove to himself that he could. Sometimes he still reached for things with his right before he remembered.

The memories were cold and heavy inside him, but he jerked back to himself when Akira began stroking along his fingers. “No more questions,” Akira promised, though he probably had them.

Maybe because he knew Akechi would tell him, knew Akechi was incapable of keeping quiet. It _was_ a relief that Akira wouldn’t ask, because Akechi didn’t know what it would do to him to say this. He’d thought about saying it a hundred times before, of course, saying it to Sae or a camera or even out loud to himself in the mirror, and now he didn’t know which story was the real one and didn’t trust himself not to lie.

Akechi tried to smile and felt like a scarecrow. “Take off the other one,” he said, voice strained.

Akira was precise without being either too slow or too fast, which Akechi appreciated because the other hand was worse—in addition to the scars, there was a burn on the back of his hand between his thumb and forefinger, where he’d gotten overconfident early in physical therapy and spilled scalding water on himself. 

Which, come to think of it, had also played a part in his decision to switch his dominant hand. Akechi hadn’t remembered the order of those events until now.

Akira met his eyes, then, some tenderness in them freezing Akechi in place even as Akira lifted his right hand and pressed a kiss right at the edge of the burn, between two scars. Akechi made a small, awful sound in the back of his throat.

“Shh,” Akira murmured against his skin. His lips were so _soft._ Akechi was torn between pushing him away and rearranging his own life so he was never anywhere but here. “I got this.”

He believed Akira. He’d never had a reason not to. Believed him even as the kisses dropped slowly along his thumb to the inside of his wrist, pausing at the sleeve. Then Akira looked up at him, smiling tentatively.

Akechi hadn’t moved in a few minutes, body locked with the effort of keeping his painful want inside him. He nodded once, jerkily, and let Akira guide him to the bed.

“Not tonight,” he said, as Akira pushed him down. “Please—I can’t—”

“No,” Akira replied quickly. “Nothing at all, I promise. Just stay for a while, okay?”

Akechi nodded, gathering his courage to draw Akira in against him. Easier to have Akira still touching his hands with his back to Akechi, so Akechi didn’t have to worry so much about what his face gave away.

It was a good call, because Akira was unrelentingly fascinated with his hands, knitting their fingers together and tracing every line. Akechi’s gloves lay next to the pillow in a sad pile, and Akechi buried his shaky breaths in Akira’s shoulder and swam in the sugary intensity of Akira’s gentleness against a part of Akechi no one had touched in years.

He thought he was still whimpering a little, but Akira didn’t seem to mind that and he hadn’t broken Akechi’s trust _yet,_ and maybe it was stupid to think it would still be alright if he did, just because it was _him._

“Sleep here tonight,” Akira told him, hands curled loosely over Akechi’s fingers.

Akechi closed his eyes. He could have made it back tonight, if he booked a cab. But he was heavy with exhaustion, too fragile to last by himself. “Alright.”

~

Haru was, thankfully, not too upset about being denied these additions to her collection. Yusuke knew he was doing the right thing, but came away having promised her a portrait of herself, which didn’t add up quite right.

Ryuji reassured him that Haru was paying for their next outing, which didn’t seem to have anything to do with anything either.

“You’re painting Haru?” Ann said. They were sitting at their usual table at LeBlanc, her next to Makoto and Ryuji next to Yusuke.

“Yes,” Yusuke said. “She wants it for her sitting room.”

“Huh,” Ann said, and put her chin on the backs of her hands. “I could also model for you, you know.” She sounded reproachful, but her words sparked a wealth of relief and delight in Yusuke.

“I thought you didn’t want to model for him anymore,” Makoto said. “You spent _all_ day telling me about how you were no longer going to model for him—”

“I changed my mind,” Ann said. Her cheeks were pink. 

Yusuke dived under the table for his sketchbook just in time to miss Ryuji saying, “Are you seriously _jealous_?”

“I am not!” Ann said.

“I would not accuse a lady as fair as Ann of such a base emotion,” Yusuke said, resurfacing. Mostly he didn’t want Ann to change her mind again.

Sketching Ann remained as awfully frustrating an exercise as ever. He couldn’t capture the—what had Akechi called it? The _Schein,_ the essence that shined through. But it had become almost pleasant to try, over and over again, to have no hope of success and create something anyway.

 _Failure is how you learn things,_ Madarame had said once, and Yusuke had listened then, but not understood. He didn’t respect Madarame anymore, but he thought he knew the truth of that now, how failure could be as thrilling as success, how it felt like a private discovery.

“Where is Akira?” Ryuji was saying, as Yusuke tuned back into the conversation. “I thought he’d be here by now. We’ve been waiting for an _hour._ ”

“Akira and Futaba have gone shopping,” Boss said from behind the counter. “I thought you knew.”

“They didn’t tell us,” Makoto sighed. “You think we should meet up with them somewhere near the shopping district?”

“I wanna eat something,” Ryuji groaned. “I can’t survive off of coffee and curry—though the curry’s _great,_ of course.”

“Damn right it is,” Boss muttered.

Ann ended up calling Akira, who suggested they meet at the park and then head over for dinner together.

“I guess the park’s alright,” Ryuji said grudgingly.

Yusuke nodded vaguely. “I can practice some nature drawings at the park,” he said.

“Do you ever think about anything else?” Ryuji demanded

Yusuke considered this. Shook his head. It wasn’t actually true that he never thought about anything other than art, but certainly true that it took precedence in his mind, lit everything that mattered by its patient light. But he didn’t want to try explaining that to Ryuji, who would never understand, so he swallowed it down and got up.

It was a clear and pleasant evening, and the park was mostly occupied by people walking their dogs or their partners around. Their little group floated gently around until Yusuke spotted Futaba and Akira on a bench, Futaba’s head invisible behind an enormous cotton candy bear.

“There,” Yusuke said. Ryuji waved enthusiastically.

“I want cotton candy,” Ann murmured dreamily.

“Let’s go find it,” Makoto suggested, and they headed off together.

Yusuke and Ryuji made their way over to the bench. “Hey,” Akira said. “Sorry for the wait.”

“Eh, it’s fine,” Ryuji said, and Yusuke nodded along.

“Did you get any shopping done?” he inquired, because he couldn’t see any bags with them. There were usually more bags, when Ann and Makoto and Haru snagged Akira on shopping trips.

Akira looked a little guilty. “We didn’t,” Futaba said, resurfacing from behind her cotton candy. “I didn’t like anything they had. And I’d rather shop online, anyway.”

“We watched a movie instead,” Akira added.

“Y’all watched a movie without me,” Ryuji said mournfully. “Not cool, dude.”

“You’ll live,” Akira laughed. He got to his feet and stretched. “Where are Makoto and Ann?”

“Cotton candy,” Yusuke said. “Ann wanted cotton candy.”

“I should tell them to get another,” Akira mumbled, and called them up.

“What for?” Yusuke asked, but Akira ignored him.

Ryuji and Futaba fell into an argument about the movie, and Yusuke got out his sketchbook to make a quick little doodle of a chibified Futaba trying to eat an enormous cotton candy bear. He’d eschewed such drawings in his youth, considering them frivolous and an underuse of his skills, but lately he’d decided he liked them. He liked knowing they’d piss Madarame off.

Makoto and Ann returned eventually, laden with cotton candy. “I didn’t know you liked sugar so much,” Makoto said, handing the bear she was carrying to Akira.

“Not for me,” Akira said quickly. “I’m waiting for someone.”

“Can I see that?” Makoto asked Yusuke, and startled, he tilted his sketchbook to show her the chibi Futaba. “That’s so cute!”

“It’s meant to be,” Yusuke said gravely, and Makoto gave him a warm smile.

“But we’re all here,” Ann said. “Haru said she can’t make it today.”

Akira looked a little tense when Yusuke looked up again. “Not Haru. I don’t know if he’ll even be able to come—”

“He’d _better,_ ” Futaba said darkly.

“Uhh,” Ann said, sounding exasperated and impatient. “Who are we talking about?”

Yusuke figured it out a split second before a voice behind him said, “Hi! Sorry about the wait, I had this photoshoot that ran _so_ late.”

Akira broke into a grin, the kind Yusuke was unused to seeing from him. “Here you go,” he said, pushing past Yusuke to hand Akechi the cotton candy bear.

“Dude, _seriously_?” Ryuji muttered. Futaba looked grim, and Ann looked confused. Yusuke couldn’t see Makoto’s face, but the expression on Akechi’s was a sharp contrast to the one Yusuke had seen from him a few days ago at another park, when Yusuke had only had to mention Akira’s name for Akechi to look stricken.

“I can’t eat all of this,” Akechi was saying. “You’ll have to eat half.”

“If you insist,” Akira grinned, and suddenly, just like that, everyone was back to normal. Yusuke wondered, sometimes, if Akira _knew_ the effect he had on the rest of them, how much they’d give to see him happy. He didn’t seem aware of it at all, which wasn’t saying much; Akira had many masks.

Akechi looked as caught in the spell as the rest of them, but Yusuke had known that already. 

Dinner was a loud affair, because Futaba and Ryuji picked up their argument about movies once again and Akechi leaned across the table and struck up a conversation with Makoto about some aspect of law Yusuke couldn’t make head or tail of. Akira looked as confused and bored by all of it as Yusuke felt, rolling his eyes at Yusuke before he reached for one of Akechi’s hands (he talked with as many gestures as words) and dragged it down to the table, now knit together with Akira’s fingers.

Yusuke dived for his sketchbook again, charmed by their closeness, the slight heightening in Akechi’s voice as he kept talking without pause, the way Akira looked perfectly pleased to simply lean against Akechi’s side and rub the knuckles of his gloved hand.

The sketch bloomed across the page, simple and eloquent and bathed in light. He was done by the time their orders arrived. 

He tore it out of his sketchbook, folding it in half and handing it to Akira.

Akira gave him a bemused look, but opened it. Surprise swept over his face, and he blushed as Akechi turned to look too.

“Thank you,” Akechi said, voice so quiet Yusuke barely caught it. “It’s...lovely.”

Akira looked up at Akechi. “It really is.”

**Author's Note:**

> edit: check out [this lovely (spoilery, hence linked at the end) art that @justtuggi made for this fic!](https://twitter.com/JustTuggi/status/1310889847540903938?s=20)
> 
> please comment if you liked this! even small ones keep me going. i am on tumblr @ciaran and twitter @akechigore.


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